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THE WEEKLY BRIEFWeek ending October 30, 2026

AI spending concerns shake Wall Street as the Fed holds rates and oil prices climb

The Nasdaq fell 2.9% Friday as Intel, Amazon and Alphabet results revived worries about AI costs, leaving the S&P 500 with a third straight weekly loss. The Fed held rates in a split vote, Brent settled at $117.64, and next week brings the midterms and the October jobs report.

S&P 500 this week7,580.07−0.6% for the week · Friday −1.82%
Last Friday 7,623.68Fed holdsMonTueWedThuFri

Daily closes, Oct. 26–30, 2026. Source: AP.

Reporting cutoff: U.S. market close, Friday, October 30, 2026. This is a dated snapshot, not a live market update.

S&P 500 Friday−1.82%Close: 7,580.07 · Week: −0.6%
Fed funds range3.75–4%Held Oct. 28 · 10–2 vote, 2 wanted a hike
Q3 GDP growth3.4%Annualized · Up from 2.2% in Q2
Brent crude$117.64Expiring Dec. contract · January at $113.43

Three forces shaping the week

  1. AI costs hit Big Tech

    Intel fell about 29% Friday on weak guidance, and Amazon and Alphabet showed negative free cash flow from heavy AI spending, pushing the Nasdaq down 2% for the week.

  2. The Fed holds, but it’s split

    Rates stayed at 3.75%–4% in a 10–2 vote, with two officials wanting a hike as PCE inflation reached 3.6% and GDP grew 3.4%.

  3. Oil keeps climbing

    Brent settled at $117.64 Friday and gained about 13.6% in October on Middle East supply worries.

Past Market Briefs → · Revisit previous weekly editions.

Beyond TechTechnology, second-order effects, and markets.

Weekly column · November 6, 2026

AI Is Starting to Improve AI. And That Could Change Everything.

An independent assessment found benchmark scores for Anthropic’s models rising about 1.9 times faster than before, mostly thanks to AI-assisted research. What a faster feedback loop could mean, and why the evidence still has limits.

“The next major breakthrough in AI might not simply be a smarter machine. It could be a machine that helps us discover the next breakthrough faster.”
From this week’s column

Finance, Simplified · This week’s lesson · November 6, 2026

Purchasing Power: Why $100 Doesn’t Buy What It Used To

Your balance can stay the same while what it buys shrinks. See how inflation eats into purchasing power, and why real returns matter, in about two minutes.

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